Page 68 of Lonely Alpha

Just my luck, the woman interrogating me was an old friend.

OK, friend is a gross overstatement. I got her demoted from the GPRE—which was the only reason she was working here—and she was trying to twist my words to fit her agenda.

“Are you sure about that?” Jennika asked, leaning across the metal table like she was ready for me to tell her a secret.

I raised an eyebrow. “Does anyone know about the conflict of interest here? If you wanted to get demoted again, we could arrange it.”

She scowled and sat back. Her back was always ramrod straight, the poster child for good posture. There were a few more wisps fraying from her slicked back ponytail than there had been the last time I’d seen her, but I guess stress came with the demotion.

And the pay dip.

Poor her.

“Please answer the question, Ms. Winston.”

“Yes, I am absolutely certain my omega didn’t tell me how the bruises on her neck appeared. All I know is she came to me with them and asked for the bond. I gave it to her.”

My fingernails clacked against the metal table, my wrist movement impeded by the handcuffs. They were going to take them off in this interrogation room, but Jennika had recommended I be shackled to the middle of the table instead.

“Will Kiara have the same story to tell?”

“It’s not a story, because it’s the truth. We’ve been around the block five times by now, Jennika. Your seers have finished looking at her, and they’ll reveal the truth that none of us can see. The dark bond was created with permission. End of story.”

“Seers can’t tell if it was a coerced bond.”

I sighed heavily. “No, but my omega would tell you if it was a coerced bond. That’s why we’re separated, right? So she can feel safe from me?”

“Your story doesn’t line up.” She leaned across the table, placing her hand on top of mine and making me snarl. “A bitch like you couldn’t love an omega enough to bond them and torpedo your own reputation.”

She whispered the words so quietly none of the recording equipment in here would pick it up.

I ignored her.

Of course I was known to be a frigid bitch, but Jennika didn’t know me any deeper than that. I was furious about my business being ruined, but would never blame Kiara for ruining that. I would do this all over again, the exact same way.

But did Kiara feel the same way? She’d had limited choices in alphas and not much time available.

Gritting my teeth and showing a hint of my weakness to my interrogator, I shoved the thoughts away. If Kiara didn’t want me, she never would have sung beneath my tongue or thrown herself at me when drunk. These doubts were the result of being able to feel her mild anxiety but being too far away to comfort her.

Jennika smirked. “So what do you get out of bonding the omega?”

“Love and affection,” I answered.

“You could have had that with a normal bond if you’d registered as silver status.”

“We all know how long the process is to register as silver status.”

There were hoops to jump through. More for omegas than for alphas. Once you were registered officially, your biology shifted to allow you to find a scent match among other silver status singles. You could also bond a single omega in a normal bond. That wasn’t something I could do as a packless, but not silver status, alpha.

The biology and ‘magic’ governing bonding mechanisms was hard to understand unless you were a researcher. Most of the population didn’t get into the nitty gritty.

“Wouldn’t you have waited if you really loved each other?”

It was pointless entertaining Jennika, but I didn’t have my normal level of cool. Having her poking at the legitimacy of my bond with Kiara irritated me to no end.

Ironic, because it wasn’t the most legitimate of bonds when it came down to it.

“She trusts me,” I said coldly. “Which is why she was comfortable with a dark bond.”

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